Of Wives and Men

In suggesting how men ought to love their wives, St. John Chrysostom notably said,"I have taken you in my arms, and I love you, and I prefer you to my life itself. For the present life is nothing, and my most ardent dream is to spend it with you in such a way that we may be assured of not being separated in the life reserved for us. I place your love above all things, and nothing would be more bitter or painful to me than to be of a different mind than you."

This is perhaps my favorite explanation of love between a man and woman, that the man who loves a woman wants heaven for her more than anything. No pleasure on earth could outmatch his desire to be with her for eternity. Inasmuch as we are loved, so we seek to love.
"No one takes My life from me; I freely give it."
Subdeacon Stephen Muse (Ph.D.) has commented on this and it's scurried 'round my mind ever since:

"The many ways that we discover the length and depth and breadth of divine love in our lives as we wrestle with the meaning and purpose of life on earth in the smallest details of our lives testifies to the truth of Ernesto Cardenal’s observation that we human beings 'are not a meaningless passion as Sartre supposed but a passion whose meaning is God.' Someone asked Archimandrite Sophrony once during one of his talks, 'Tell me, Father, what is God?' Archimandrite Sophrony responded, 'First, you tell me, what is man?' Paul Ricoeur said, 'The quickest way to the self is through the other.' Jean-Paul Sartre said, 'The other is hell.' Perhaps Orthodoxy’s combination of these two is, 'The way to God is through hell for the sake of the other.'"
To rather go to hell for the other, than heaven without them.
God, please help us love as You do.